Clinton to speak, try to pull backers to Obama

Aug. 26, 2008 09:03 AMAssociated Press

DENVER -- The last hurrah for Hillary Rodham Clinton's still-angry supporters at the Democratic Convention Tuesday night could spell the difference between victory and defeat for the presidential aspirations of Barack Obama.

In the two months since Clinton ceded the nomination, she and Obama have danced a political minuet. The New York senator has sided with her primary campaign rival, as Obama has at once battled forward in an increasingly negative campaign against Republican John McCain and looked over his shoulder to a massive bloc of Clinton backers who refuse to join with him.

As Clinton prepared to laud her former opponent, McCain released a new TV ad that uses some of the former first lady's words from the primary campaign to skewer Obama as too inexperienced for the presidency. Clinton has denounced such tactics.

Clinton's Tuesday night speech — a much anticipated appearance on the second day of the four-day event — follows a night in which Obama's wife, Michelle, and Sen. Edward Kennedy, a liberal lion and scion of a famed political dynasty, issued impassioned appeals for party unity in the face of a stiff challenge from Republicans.

Obama will speak Thursday, the last night of the convention, when he accepts the party's nomination.

With McCain drawing even with Obama, or nearly so, depending on the public opinion poll, a new survey showed 30 percent of Clinton supporters declaring they will vent their anger over her loss by voting for McCain, a third party candidate or no one.

Clinton says she has told her supporters she is voting for Obama's nomination Wednesday night but she cannot control the decisions of her delegates to the convention or of the 18 million people who cast their ballots for her in the extended and ofttimes bitter primary struggle won two months ago by Obama.

Behind the scenes, Obama's representatives reached an agreement with the former first lady's camp to limit a divisive roll call for the nomination, giving delegates a brief but historic choice between a black man and white woman.

The deal would allow some states to cast votes for both Obama and Clinton before ending the roll call in acclamation for the Illinois senator. Clinton herself may cut off the vote and recommend unanimous nomination of Obama, according to Democratic officials involved in the negotiations. They discussed the deal on condition of anonymity while details were being finalized.

But some Clinton delegates said they were not interested in a compromise, raising the prospect of floor demonstrations that would underscore the damaging split between Obama and Clinton Democrats.

"I don't care what she says," said Mary Boergers, a Clinton delegate from Maryland.

Meanwhile, McCain was using Clinton's primary campaign rhetoric against the Democrats. The Republican's latest TV ad played off Clinton's primary campaign spot featuring sleeping children and a phone call portending a crisis. In the new ad Clinton is shown saying: "I know Sen. McCain has a lifetime of experience that he will bring to the White House. And, Sen. Obama has a speech he gave in 2002." A narrator adds: "Hillary's right. John McCain for president."

Clinton told supporters after similar efforts to use her words against Obama, "I'm Hillary Clinton and I do not approve that message."

Clinton's speech to the Tuesday session of the convention and that of her husband, former President Bill Clinton, the next night will be closely analyzed. Bill Clinton was very outspoken in defense of his wife during the primary, leading some to wonder whether he harbors hard feelings toward Obama.

The convention keynote speaker — former Virginia Gov. Mark Warner — will share the night with Hillary Clinton, whose candidacy he backed in the primary season. Obama is fighting hard to put Virginia in his column in November, upending its recent tradition of voting for Republicans for president.

Warner, who is running for an open Senate seat from the state, will deliver his address after a parade of Democratic governors, House and Senate leaders have come and gone from the convention lectern on a night the Democrats have entitled "Renewing America's Promise."

It was that promise that drove Monday night's electrifying speeches by Michelle Obama and an ailing but impassioned Kennedy, whose appearance was not assured until he was introduced by his niece, Caroline Kennedy Schlossberg.

The convention hall erupted as Kennedy, who is suffering brain cancer, marched strongly onto the stage.

"This November the torch will be passed again to a new generation of Americans, so with Barack Obama and for you and for me, our country will be committed to his cause," Kennedy said. "The work begins anew. The hope rises again. And the dream lives on."
Michelle Obama, who has come under attack by Republicans trying to paint her as an unpatriotic radical, sought to turn the tables on her critics. She told cheering delegates at Denver's Pepsi Center and a national television audience that she and the possible future president share with them the same hopes and dreams.

"That is the thread that connects our hearts. That is the thread that runs through my journey and Barack's journey and so many other improbable journeys that have brought us here tonight, where the current of history meets this new tide of hope.

"That is why I love this country."

She said her husband would bring "the change we need," and pledged he would end the war in Iraq, revive a sputtering economy and extend health care to all.

The first night of the convention concluded with Michelle Obama and her daughters Malia, 10, and Sasha, 7, on stage, talking to the candidate over a satellite link from a family's home in Kansas City, Missouri, where he had watched his wife tell their family story.